Complexify - A JQuery Password Strength Plugin

Whilst we're mentioning my friend Dan Palmer, it only seemed fitting that I link to his recent JavaScript project, Complexify. It's super cool. He explains:

Many websites give an indicator of how secure a password is, and require a minimum standard of security. However this is always poorly implemented with rules such as 'must require a number' even if the password is 30 characters long and clearly very secure. Often the only requirement is a minimum number of characters, a very poor indicator of password strength.

Complexify calculates a rating for the password based on how difficult it would be to brute-force it.

Enter your password to a service which is vital to you in the demo box on Dan's site. How strong is your password? Mine comes to 86%. I'm assured by Dan that 86% is a pretty good score.

All The Web Utilities You Need

Yesterday, I wrote a piece for The Industry, which covered Sacha Greif's new tool, The Toolbox:

Enjoy our post last week, CSS Arrow, please, detailing the great online tool to help create CSS arrows?

Well, Sacha Greif did. In fact, he enjoyed the post so much, it compelled him to create Toolbox – a collection of the best time-saving apps, tools, and widgets from around the web.

The State Of Home Routers

Dan Palmer discusses the failing security of home routers, and reaches a conclusion I'd formed a while back:

If a non-expert like myself managed to find these [security vulnerabilities] within a few hours of owning a SuperHub, what could an expert find in a few days of research, or what is there lying underneath the surface just waiting to be exploited? I have no confidence in the ability of the developers based on what I have seen today, and I would never voluntarily put a network’s security in their hands. I have raised these issues with Virgin Media and will be making a formal complaint.

The routers which broadband providers give customers have always been awful, in my experience. My own home network has been running using the router Sky Broadband gave us when we signed up years ago, alongside a 2008 Apple Airport Express. This Airport Express has been a trusty little device, never faultering.

I'm beginning to think that it'd be a good time to upgrade my Airport express to a more powerful, faster router. One which isn't WiFi-only.

My plan involves keeping the horrible Sky router, but buying a quality, fast, third-party router to connect directly to the Sky router - then all the computers in the house can connect to that. No more will my home network be limited by my 100Mbps Sky router(yes, really - it's awful).

Internships At The Khan Academy

Official Khan Blog:

At some point in a new employee’s first day they will hear some variation of the words, “I’m your official mentor. As we work through your first few projects together, you can interrupt me any time for any technical question, non-technical question, question about the rules of Bang!, or just because you want to order a specific keyboard. Don’t think twice.”

I'd love to be an intern there. They're doing it right. Their Friday Tech Talks sound brilliant.

Plus, I'd order a Das Keyboard immediately.

UK Government Staff Caught Snooping On Citizen Data

Zack Whittaker, CNET:

Between April 2010 and March 2011, 513 civil servants were found to have made “unauthorised disclosures of official, sensitive, private and/or personal information”. The year continuing, between April 2011 and January 2012, more than 460 staff were disciplined.

This is absolutely unacceptable and it horrifies me.

iOS Web Apps, Icons And Startup Images

Andrew Pez Pengelly has a great post, detailing how to name and place apple-touch-icons for web apps, which helped me ensure I was using the best method for this site:

Best practice right now is to include one 114 x 114 icon and one 144 x 144 icon for iPhone/iPod and iPad respectively. Non retina devices will scale down retina icons if we specify the correct icon to use. Sizes are specified by the sizes attribute.

I overhauled everything in the recent redesign, including these apple-touch-icons.

Go ahead; save Chasing Perfection to you iOS device's home screen as a web clip. Looks great, right?

The Essence Of Blogging

Jim Dalrymple, over at The Loop:

A blog isn’t about the feelings of the company, but rather a personal look at the writer. You can’t assign a blogger a story and hope the audience doesn’t get the fact that they have no idea what they’re talking about or worse yet, they don’t really care.

Readers connect with a blogger. They know things about them, they laugh together and sometimes argue over points in a story. It’s a give and take relationship that not everyone can handle.

This personal touch to blogging is what draws me to the field. I love getting a more intimate look at what interests the many bloggers I subscribe to - there's a different connection when you know the writer is just a person. I believe that touch adds value.

I'm just a person, too. I hope my readers appreciate that.

One Android Developer Encounters 3,997 Devices

This is fragmentation at its worst.

Imagine having to test your app on 100 different devices, let alone four thousand.

It boggles the mind.

GoSquared Analytics

My friend Mark Smith has a look at the London based GoSquared Analytics service. He nails it:

While Google Analytics still has a place for those that need comprehensive conversion rates and full e-commerce analysis, the instant simplicity of GoSquared gives you exactly what you need to keep your customers engaged on your personal site or blog.

I've been using GoSquared here, along with Google Analytics for a few months now. I prefer pretty much everything about GoSquared.

Free Will

Last night, I started (and finished) reading Free Will by Sam Harris. In it, he disassembles the concept of free will entirely, covering every argument for and against the concept, whilst keeping the book short(68 pages), witty and entertaining.

Some passages in the book are slightly more technical than others, but there is an overarching narrative which is perfect for newcomers to the topic such as myself. I plan to re-read it in a month or so. Highly recommended.

Here are a few thought-provoking excerpts from the book:

The only skills at your disposal are those inherited from moments passed.

Man can do what he wills but he cannot will what he wills.

You will do whatever it is you do, and it is meaningless to assert that you could have done otherwise.

The urge for retribution depends upon our not seeing the underlying causes of human behaviour.

If we could incarcerate earthquakes and hurricanes for their crimes, we would build prisons for them as well.

If we made sneezing illegal, some number of people would break the law however severe the consequences.

These lead to perhaps my favourite quote by Harris:

The illusion of free will is in itself an illusion.

If you're planning to buy a copy of this book, I'd appreciate if you'd use one of my affiliate links:

• Free Will paperback ($9.99)
• Free Will kindle edition ($3.99)

Thank you. I think you'll enjoy it.